Let Me Love You Again (An Echoes of the Heart Novel Book 2) (35 page)

Daddy
.

“Would it be so bad,” Camille asked, “for me to belong to Oliver and his family?” Camille sat up in the bed, squeezing Grammy’s quilt close. “I like it next door. I like it with you and Mommy at your house. And playing in your yard and staying in Mommy’s
room . . . But I like the Dixons, too. And they like me. Teddy and Fin and Lisa and everyone. I know they do.” She
hoped
they did. “Would it be so bad, to want to be part of them, too?”

Grammy looked at her for a long time, like Grammy looked at Mommy a lot—when Mommy thought Grammy was going to be mad, but Camille thought Grammy was just trying not to say the wrong thing. “I don’t think having more family in your life is ever a bad thing.”

“Really?”

Grammy nodded. “Even if sometimes family makes us angry or scared.”

“Like I was this morning? And Mommy, too?”

Grammy nodded again. “Family, real family, is never a bad thing, no matter how it happens into your life.” She smoothed her hand over one of the tulips her mommy’s mommy had sewn a long, long time ago. “Do you know why this is my favorite quilt?”

“’Cause it’s pretty, and your grammy made it?”

Camille’s grammy brushed her hand wider, across the colors and prints that made the different flowers and pieces of the quilt. Everything was white and pink, or something close to white and pink. The pieces were all different shapes, but they were so pretty together.

Her grammy had told her, when she’d let Camille pick the quilt from the stack in her bedroom closet, that some of the pieces had come from worn-out clothes and even the sacks people used to sell stuff in, like corn and beans and things. And Grammy’s grammy had cut it all up into different shapes and sizes, when people stopped using their old things. She’d made the quilt out of stuff that would have been thrown away.

Grammy smiled. “Families are like quilts, honey. All kinds of people, coming together, sometimes from all kinds of places. Just
look at how different your mommy and me are now. How long we’ve lived without each other—most of your life. But we’re still family, right? You and me and your mom.”

Camille nodded.

“All families,” Grammy said, “even the ones with different parts that don’t look like they’d fit together, can be beautiful—if you put enough work into them. And once you get the work right, like my grammy did with this quilt—because she knew all the different-shaped pieces would make lovely flowers for me—what you create can be the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen.”

“It’s so pretty.” Camille brushed her hand over the quilt, just like Grammy.

“Some people think quilts look messy,” Grammy said. “But a good quilt, if it’s strong enough, will last forever. And more than anything else, that’s why this one’s
my
favorite. My grandmother made it a long time ago, and it’s been used a lot. I used to drag it all over the place, the same as you do. And look how beautiful it still is. It’s still strong, even if it’s not perfect anymore. And now I get to share it with you. Because our family’s turned out to be strong, too, honey. No matter how different your mommy and I are, I get to share my flowers and my bubble bath with you. And your mommy’s old room in my house. And the town I love so much. It’s all even more special to me now.”

“Because you love me so much, too?”

“I love you and your mommy both, sweetie. I’m so glad to have you in Chandlerville with me. That’s why I wanted you to have this quilt. I want you to think of me every time you use it. Just like when I see it, I think of my grammy.”

“I . . . I can keep it?”

“It’s yours now.”

Because Camille and her mommy were still going to leave?

“Do you . . .” Camille couldn’t stop herself from asking again. “Do you think the Dixons would be glad to have me, too?”

Oliver had said they would.

“Of course we’re happy to have you as part of our family,” a voice said from the doorway.

Mrs. Dixon was standing there.

And so was Camille’s mommy.

“I brought you a visitor,” Mommy said. She was smiling like Grammy had—like Camille wasn’t really in trouble at all. “Are you feeling up for it?”

Camille stared as Mommy sat next to her, while Mrs. Dixon stood next to Grammy.

“I’m so sorry, Cricket.” Mommy kissed Camille on the forehead. “I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you the truth, and you had to hear me and Grammy talking about the Dixons and Oliver, instead of me talking to you myself.”

“But I shouldn’t have snuck next door. I shouldn’t have eaten one of Teddy’s crackers. I thought it would be okay,” she said to Mrs. Dixon. “Because your cookies are okay. But I should have asked first. I shouldn’t have come over to your house at all.”

“Yes,” Mommy said. “You should have. You should have gotten to know them a long time ago, as soon as Mr. and Mrs. Dixon wanted us to visit. You wanted to go, and I said no, because . . .”

Camille picked at the biggest flower on her quilt.

Because her mommy was sad. That’s what was wrong. It’s what had been wrong for a long time. Camille wanted Oliver to be her daddy, and his family to be her family. But she wanted her mommy to be happy more than anything. More than staying at Grammy’s. More than being a Dixon.

“I won’t go back next door.” She crushed a flower in her hand. “If you don’t want me to, I won’t want the Dixons to be my family.
I won’t visit them anymore or play with Teddy and the other kids or see Oliver. I won’t want them to be my family ever again.”

“But they
are
your family,” her mommy said.

“They . . . they are?”

Mommy smiled. “And I’m very glad they are. I shouldn’t have kept them from you. I shouldn’t have made you afraid of talking to me about it. You shouldn’t be afraid of any of this, Camille.”

Camille looked up at Mrs. Dixon, wondering if she was glad, too. She checked with her grammy to see if it was really okay.

“This must be a lot to take in.” Mrs. Dixon sat on the edge of the bed. “You must have tons of questions.”

Camille couldn’t think of any of her questions anymore. The Dixons were really hers. All of them different. All of them together. Like everyone sitting around Camille now.

Mommy had said once that she looked a lot like
her
daddy. The granddaddy Camille had never met. Grammy was smaller, with blonde hair and blue eyes like Camille had sometimes wanted, though Grammy had said Camille’s green eyes were prettier. Mrs. Dixon had red hair, and lots of white hair, too, and really white skin. And they were all Camille’s, Mommy was saying. Like the tulip quilt—different things, but they were so pretty when you put them together.

“I get to be in your family,” she asked Mrs. Dixon, “no matter who my daddy turns out to be?”

Mrs. Dixon looked tired, and maybe like she might be sad a little, too. But it must be a happy kind of sad, ’cause she was smiling.

“Always, Camille. Joe and I have lots of kids who come from lots of different places and mommies and daddies. And that’s never stopped us from loving any of them as much as they’d let us. We already think of you as our granddaughter. Joe’s in the hospital, too. And he heard you weren’t feeling well, and he wants
me to hurry back and tell him how you’re doing. He’d love to see you, now that he’s getting his new room and the doctors will let kids in before long. Do you think you’d like to visit your grandpa one day soon?”

Camille held on to her quilt, the way she had that morning, staring out her bedroom window and wishing she understood everything she’d heard her mommy and grammy saying. And then she’d dragged it outside, so she could be close enough to the Dixon house to sneak over. And now she was hugging it and wanting to hug Mrs. Dixon, too.

And then she was in Mrs. Dixon’s arms, and Mrs. Dixon was holding her like Grammy always did. Like she wanted to keep Camille with her always.

“Can I?” Camille asked her mommy, still hugging Mrs. Dixon. “Can I go visit my grandpa soon?”

Chapter Twenty-Two

Selena had stayed with Camille until her daughter fell asleep, Bear in her arms, tucked in beneath her quilt, dreaming happy family dreams.

Belinda and Marsha had slipped away a half hour ago, leaving Selena to read to her daughter about Alice’s adventures finding her way home. Selena’s baby had finally run out of questions to ask about the Dixons and Joe and Marsha and Oliver. Answers Selena couldn’t fully wrap her head around yet. Not all of them. So she’d kept telling Camille that everything was going to be okay. Just like Oliver had promised Selena when they were teenagers, and again just a few days ago.

She shut the door to Camille’s room behind her and faced the trio in the hallway. She’d heard Belinda and Marsha talking with Dru and Brad and Oliver as the women left. Dru was at Brad’s side, both of them leaning against the wall across from Camille’s door. Oliver stood slightly separate, on his own. He stepped toward Selena, then stopped in the middle of the hallway, his hands digging into his jeans pockets, his gaze intense but uncertain. Waiting. But for what?

“Camille wants to see her grandpa, as soon as Joe’s up to visitors,” Selena told him. “I’m sorry I’ve put this off. For Marsha and Joe, and for all of you. I let myself worry about . . .” Belonging, leaving, never wanting to leave again. “I shouldn’t have let anything get in the way of my daughter knowing your family.”

She shifted her attention to Brad.

“I behaved selfishly. Seven years ago. The last two months. I wouldn’t blame you for never forgiving me. I really am sorry, for all of it.” She looked to Dru. “How much I hurt you, especially when Oliver left and then Brad. When I think of what you and Brad might have had for all these years if it wasn’t for me . . .”

No one said anything, and Selena was grateful. This was her moment—the one she knew she finally had to deal with, or she’d always be looking back.

“Brad . . .” She shook her head at him. “I don’t know what to say. Except that I never meant to use you. I was just so scared back then. But there’s one thing I’m not sorry for.”

She sensed Oliver hanging on every word.

“I’m not sorry that my daughter is the result of my mistakes,” she said to him, to all of them. “I’ve been grateful every day that I’ve had Camille with me. I didn’t deserve such an unexpected blessing. Just know that from the start, I was trying to do my best for my daughter. I still am.”

“Of course you are.” Dru inched closer. “We’re all grateful to you for bringing her home.”

Selena wished it could be that simple. “That’s nice. But after I slept with Brad, you—”

“I was pissed for a while, sure.”

“A while?” Brad joined his fiancée.

“Okay.” Dru elbowed him in the ribs. “For a few years. But”—she smiled at Selena—“I have a niece to play with now. Or a
stepdaughter. And Brad and I are getting married. And you and Oliver are . . .”

Selena and Oliver were what?

She had no idea. And Oliver was just standing there, close but still distant somehow.

“Oliver and I want what’s best for Camille,” she said.

“We all do,” Brad agreed.

“No matter what . . .” Selena had sat listening to her daughter’s chatter about the Dixons and her new grandparents and family and all the things she wanted to do with them. And Selena had known she’d made the right choice, asking Marsha to join her in Camille’s room. “I want my daughter to have the life she always should have with your family.”

“Does that mean you’re staying in town?” Dru asked.

It would be so easy to say yes, spur of the moment, and figure out the details later. But Selena looked to Oliver instead. Their crazy roller coaster of a day seemed to be swirling through his mind as much as it was hers.

I don’t want this.

It’s done.

This is it for us. This is our chance.

Except by Oliver’s own admission, he was no good at long-term things. Meanwhile she needed his love every day, every up and down, every moment. Facing it all together, like Oliver’s parents had, because there was no other way for them to live.

“I don’t yet know if Camille and I are staying,” she admitted. And she saw him wince. “There’s so much else to deal with first.”

“We heard about this morning in the ER.” Brad’s features hardened with anger. “That husband of yours sounds like a real bastard.”